of the revenue from an excellent night at Covent Garden. Daly served a writ for libel on Magee in June 1789, claiming damages for injury to his reputation and business; he quantified his loss at £4,000 and obtained an order from Lord Clonmell, then Chief Justice of the King's Bench in Ireland (a close friend of Francis Higgins), requiring Magee to provide bail money in that amount. When Magee was unable to do so he was imprisoned. This triggered debate in the Irish House of Commons concerning the legality of requiring bail in defamation cases, an issue that was referred to a Grand Committee of the Courts of Justice where the Attorney-General frustrated its determination. The Whig Club, under the chairmanship of the Duke of Leinster, declared that if the order in Daly's case was properly made then "the liberty of the subject is in imminent danger". These events attracted considerable public attention and increased the prevailing unpopularity of the Irish administration. Daly's claim for libel was tried in July 1790 when eleven barristers appeared to present his case, including John Philpot Curran, Henry Duquerry, John Egan and Jonas Greene. By this time he was seeking damages of £8,000 on account of further allegations made by Magee but, while his case succeeded, the jury awarded him only £200 in damages and sixpence towards his costs. An application, by Magee's brother, to have Magee declared a lunatic had been unsuccessful, but he was later made the subject of a lunacy order. Imprisonment and scandal Disturbances at the Theatre Royal did not cease with the outcome of the Magee case and when, in the autumn of 1791, Daly and his brother Cuthbert, a barrister, came to blows with an audience member, they were themselves convicted of aiding riot and assault. Daly was sentenced to six months' imprisonment (Cuthbert to twelve) and the Viceroy, Lord Westmorland, had to intervene to procure his release from Newgate. While Daly was in prison there was published in London a lurid account of Elizabeth Billington's alleged adultery with him during her time at Smock Alley in early 1784, shortly after her marriage and when already pregnant. By 1792 Mrs Billington was the principal diva at Covent Garden and rumoured to have slept with a succession of Dukes and the Prince of Wales, and the publication created a minor sensation, selling out almost immediately. The Scots Magazine considered